Shade Filled Bars

[Yevheniy Kharchenko]

Yevheniy didn't much like returning back to Ukraine, he might be the leader of his own faction of the Scits in New Zealand, but when he went to his father, his father still treated him like the seventeen year old who got drunk and vomited all over the kitchen floor, the kid who didn't understand that he wasn't supposed to be anything other than straight. His uncles treated him better, but every time he went it was just a disaster and he was always dealing with the aftermath for the week after the residue anger, pain from the fights and a general distance much worse than normal, it was just frustrating that he returned home one weekend in every month, he was beginning to think that he should extend that, make it every two months so he would stop having to deal with everything that came with visiting his father so often. The point of fighting this weekend had once again been Yev's sexuality, as it had always been since he'd spoken to his father about what he was, in the simplest manner, but his father hadn't yet come to understand it, and had once again just berated and pushed Yevheniy into spending the night with some Ukrainian girl, which Yev had regretted, since she like any of the girls he'd slept with, just not been what he wanted, and his father had barely blinked at him when he told him the next day she'd left right after.

Yevheniy identified as bisexual though not that openly, but a part of his mind knew firmly that that was a lie, but he just couldn't be gay, if his father's reaction to his bisexuality was as much of an issue as it was, he couldn't help but think that his homosexuality would erupt in ways that Yev wasn't ready to deal with from any person much less his father. So he convinced himself he wasn't, that he enjoyed sleeping with girls, which was easier than admitting the truth about who he was and it didn't matter since he had returned to New Zealand, and continued forward in his life, where it was just another thing about his life he didn't talk about. He had a serious black eye, and his knuckles were scrapped and bruised, he moved stiffly, but he hadn't yet actually gone home, with that kid in his apartment he didn't want to scare him off too much and rather found himself in a rather shady magical bar, the atmosphere in which he was probably going to end up in another fight if he played his cards right. He bought three triple vodka's and then looked around the place, eventually noticing a guy a little older than himself, who looked a little familiar and decided to talk to him, if just to take his mind off the weekend at his father's, he didn't say anything as he took a seat, "Why do you seem familiar to me?" he asked his Ukrainian accent thicker on his words as he spoke and sat down, placing his drinks on the table and holding on in his hand. ​

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[Ignacio Morales]

Ignacio loved his family and made the most of every opportunity he was given to return home and see them, but there were times when a hard weeks worth of work hit him like a tonne of bricks and all he needed to cure it was to drink himself into oblivion and bask in the promise of a few hours of solitude to wind down and rid his body of pent up stress before he could consider stepping foot back in Chile. That week had unfortunately been one of those weeks, spearheaded with many failed dealings and significantly less money in his pocket to boot. Ignacio was unequipped to handle the guilt of letting his family down when it didn't involve one glass of fire whiskey after another in a shady, unfamiliar bar. So that was where the twenty-five year old found himself on that particular night. Some magical bar in New Zealand that he had never seen before in his life which, considering his career, was certainly saying something.

He brought his glass to his lips and downed whatever was left inside before ordering another, losing count of how many glasses he had finished and the bill he was raking up but alternately too tipsy and bothered by his life to care. As he waited for the new glass to appear in front of him he scanned the room around him, noting the dreary, depressed and eerily quiet atmosphere. There were other men like him around, drinking to themselves and expecting to stay that way. Ignacio definitely expected to be left alone to his alcohol consumption and the guilt of looking after his family and not always being able to do so on his shoulders but it was of course in an unwelcomed twist of the tides that someone sat across from him. With no less than a warning or introduction nonetheless. He looked to the owner of the accented voice and eyed them up an down with a smirk. They were also somewhat familiar to Ignacio though considering the amount of people he met in passing on a daily basis and with his currently more than tipsy state he could not for the life of him place his finger on who they were. So he merely continued to smirk, not batting an eyelash when they sat down in front of him and placed their drinks on the table. "Why do you seem familiar to me, too?" He queried the man in response with his equally accented tongue. It was all he could do as his newly ordered fire whiskey was placed in front of him. He picked up the glass and nodded to the other man in the most nonchalant way possible before asking "What's your poison?" and drinking as he waited for a response. ​

 

[Yevheniy Kharchenko]

Yevheniy from this man definitely got the impression that he'd seen him before, within what he did with the Scits and his own sect of it, he had found that remembering faces was definitely a key aspect, knowing how best to talk to people to manipulate them into joining his little group, and thus yev had tried to get to know people their way of speaking and general things like that but Yev couldn't place where he'd seen this man but he couldn't do anything about it, he couldn't fight against it and try to dig through his brain until he found what he wanted, after all theman was a few drinks in and he couldn't exactly think that clearly any more. His mind was foggy enough and really he was just going to have to accept that he would not get to the bottom of why this man seemed just so oddly familiar to him. The funny part of it was, that this other man didn't seem to mine Yev's slight outburst, not questioning why that would be such a thing, not taking it seriously and instead for a moment Yevheniy believed that this man thought it was a sort of chat up line, and well, after glancing the man once over he decided he very much wanted it to be and would just play along.

So, instead of pushing the issue, Yevheniy gave this man his most charming smile, which took a lot of effort for the man whose natural expression was that of a deep and angry frown, and he then took a small sip of his drink with a questioning look on his face, his poison was whatever he could get his hands on, "I'm not picky, I just like vodka the most," he told the man with a shrug, clearly indicating that he really didn't care much, the way he said vodka was in very much the Ukrainian way, a definitely more heavy accent on that work than any of the others, "I try to avoid russian vodka, but it is hard," he added as an unnecessary addition but as an interesting side point, "You?" Yevheniy returned the question before holding out his hand to the man, with the charming smile he forced on and said, "Yevheniy, but most people call me Yev because it easier," The more Yevheniy drank the heavier his accent got and the worse his english got, but this wasn't too much of an issue at hand, it would be fine. Yevheniy could handle his alcohol.
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[Ignacio Morales]

Ignacio swallowed his mouthful of fire whiskey as he stared the other man down. He matched the charming smile the man was giving him with one of his own despite wanting to cringe at the burning aftertaste of his alcohol. He was yet to reach the plateau of drunkenness where his drinks no longer burned as they ran down his throat, but he knew that his increasingly sluggish movements meant he wasn't far off. The room was also yet to spin but his vision was somewhat hazed with the alcohol that was currently affecting him and in the present that was enough for Ignacio. He could distract himself in conversation with the other man until he could down fire whiskey as if it were water, and that was exactly what the Chilean intended to do as he rested his chin on his hand and nodded politely to the other man's heavily accented words. "What's wrong with Russian Vodka?" Ignacio asked the man curiously, attempting to make proper conversation with him but not really knowing how to. He still wasn't able to place why he recognized the man and where he knew him from though he figured the realization would eventually hit him when they shared more of a conversation and with at least another glass of fire whiskey running through his veins.

"I'm drinking fire whiskey." Ignacio responded, tipping his glass towards the other man before sipping its contents again and feeling the burn trickle down his throat. As the aftertaste hit him he let out a short breath and furrowed his brows lightly. "Strong stuff." He commented. Fire whiskey was not usually Ignacio's drink of choice, on a normal day he would choose to drink beer or cider to unwind from the day but unwinding from a difficult week required something stronger that numbed his fingers faster and more intensely blurred his vision at the edges. Ignacio was ready to drink from his glass again but he paused his movements when the man introduced himself as Yevheniy. The name was not one he recognized immediately but the nickname Yev certainly rang a bell in his mind. Although much like moments earlier, Ignacio was still unsure where to place the face and name in his memory. It would make sense if they crossed paths during one of Ignacio's many odd jobs around New Zealand but what kind of job he still wasn't sure. If they had crossed paths due to his career Ignacio would have used an alias or would have not simply stated his name to avoid being recognized like he was now. So with that realization and the alcohol affecting his inhibitions he felt somewhat comfortable giving the other man his real name and not something fabricated to ensure his and his family's safety. "Ignacio." He said as he held his hand to Yev's and shook it in greeting. "Stressful day?" Ignacio asked to keep the interesting conversation going as he finally sipped more whiskey from his glass.​

 

[Yevheniy Kharchenko]

Yevheniy could've laughed at the question but he just shook his head at the man, "Russian vodka has nothing on Ukrainian, or even Polish, it's garbage," he said, barely hidden bitterness on his words in his tone, as the thick accent played with his slight drunkness but it didn't matter, this man likely didn't actually really care about his opinions on vodka, it was merely for conversation purposes and the man didn't care much, and he just looked at the other man as he stated what he was drinking and Yev nodded, he didn't much enjoy fire whisky as a drink but to him, it was all the same after a while, it took a lot to get Yevheniy truly drunk, but it was usually then that the drinks passed his lips without any forethought or after thought, they all blended into one and he took each day as it came. The scits leader looked down at his hands as he spoke, as he introduced himself to the other man, there was still such a familiarity to Yevheniy about this man sat in front of him, but it was just one he couldn't place, it was just so odd, what did it matter if this man was familiar to him, it was clear that the familiarity wasn't a bad thing, if this man was some auror he had nothing to stick Yev with, but the fact he was in this pretty shady bar, and didn't really appear to be someone who had the look of an Auror he had to assume that this man, Ignacio just wasn't one.

The name was not in the slightest familiar to Yevheniy, but he smiled at it, "Like Ignite, like fire?" he asked with a curious expression since he'd never heard that name ever in his life, and he knew that it wasn't an english name, but then Yevheniy couldn't exactly say anything with a name like his in New Zealand, but he was proudly a Ukrainian man, "I'm from Ukraine, where are you from?" he asked Ignacio pretty bluntly but it wasn't with mal-intentions that he did this, more that Yev was actually just curious about where this man was from, the name he knew was spanish, but the man might not be from Spain, he eyed the man in that moment and wondered if perhaps he was Scitorari material, he didn't seem outwardly like that, but perhaps it took dragging the conversation in a certain direction, "Stressful day, yes," he replied with a little laugh as he took his drink and just downed it in one, "When is it not?" the man said to him, "Every day is a fight, but the good thing is that every night we can drink," Yev got himself another glass of the vodka he was drinking and held it up to Ignacio, "Za zdorovje"
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[Ignacio Morales]

Ignacio chuckled as he swallowed his fire whiskey and had to hold his hand over his mouth to keep himself from spitting it out. "Yes, like fire. I burn if you get too close." He said playfully. Yev was not the first person to compare his name to fire because that was more or less his name's meaning but that did not mean Ignacio found it less funny in his tipsy state. Being compared to fire made Ignacio sound more mysterious than he truly thought he was. Mystery and intimidation was something he relied on for his career but in a shady bar where he was unknown and his pretenses pushed aside for the night, mystery mattered as much as vegetables mattered to a carnivore. It was something useless to him that would do more harm that good and he could not have cared less about it in that moment. More than anything the Chilean wanted to focus on talking to the interesting man sitting with him, continuing to make conversation as he also continued to drink the heavy stress from the week off of his shoulders. As he continued to sit in the dank bar he began to crave a cigarette but swallowed the urge as Yev continued speaking.

"Ukraine, huh?" Ignacio asked. It definitely explained Yev's interesting name and heavy accent and in a way it only made the man more interesting to Ignacio's increasingly hazed mind. "I'm from Chile." He responded bluntly, not intending to say anything more about himself to the man. He was tipsy but not stupid enough to reveal things about his family or home life when he could have recognized Yev from his career, if he remembered where he recognized him from after all. Yev's next words brought an extra amount of warmth to Ignacio's features. He agreed with everything the man was saying and raised his glass in sync with him, saying a simple "Here, here" as the glasses clinked together. He did not understand the last words from the other man's mouth but figured it wasn't too outlandish from everything else he was saying. "I'm going to go outside for a cigarette." Ignacio announced after sipping from his glass post-cheers. His nicotine cravings overtook him but he did not want to leave the man alone so after standing up from his chair and downing the fire whiskey that remained in his glass he looked to Yev and asked "Care to join?" to hopefully continue the conversation. Yev was more interesting to Ignacio by the minute and he would regret not getting to know more about the man while still in his presence because of something as small as a cigarette.​

 

[Yevheniy Kharchenko]

Yevheniy laughed heartily at the mans joke, of course Yev had not meant it as an insult but both his drunk mind and the one that had lost track of a lot of the English he had once known had to try to understand all that was told to him and therefore quite naturally translated thew name in his head, but this other man didn't seem to mind, and it appeared he was quite interest in where Yev was from and he was to an extent also a little interested in where this man was from, and the answer didn't really disappoint, Chile, that made sense in his drunken mind, even if it didn't or shouldn't really to him, but regardless of it, the man was glad to have run into him, their upbringings he knew would be entirely different, two opposite sides of the work, and the completely different cutlural aspects of it, were the sort of things that had Yev entirely curious about this man. He often met far flung people, but in his drunken, and hazy mind this was the most interesting person he had ever met, and boy was Yev interested in keeping it going, thus the continued drinking.

Yev downed the drink in one, where this others man just sipped and upon the offer, Yev nodded, he was more a social smoker than anything, though increasingly smoking whenever he really wanted to which was perhaps more often than when he had begun, but in his mind this was no more dangerous than any of the things he did with his life, so upon being offered to join, Yevheniy rose to his feet and then nodded, pulling a pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket and holding it up, he took the lead and walked out of the bar to the airy and cool outdoors, despite how much he had drank, it didn't appear to have affected Yevheniy much, he was visibly drunk, but he walked fine, and didn't struggle to light his cigarette, even offering his lighter to the other man though he was sure he had one. the Ukrainian man took a long inhale of the cigarette and then slowly blew out the smoke, letting it catch the air and disappear, "What brings you to New Zealand then? Business or pleasure?" a faint smirk on his lips at the latter half of the question.
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[Ignacio Morales]

Ignacio did not realize the affect that the many fire whiskeys were causing on his body until he stood up from his chair and felt his head rush, his mind grow fuzzier and his balance skew further off kilter. Though he did not give the experience a second thought. Soon enough Yev agreed to join his quest outside to smoke a cigarette and that was what Ignacio focused on, and why he seemingly instantly found himself standing against the front of the shady bar they were previously in as he dug one of his hands into his back pocket to retrieve his pack of cigarettes. He opened the pack and pulled one of the cigs from it, holding it between his pouted lips as he searched for his wand to light it. He was having no success pulling his wand from his pocket in his drunken state but luckily and with perfect timing Yev handed him a lighter. Ignacio smiled at the gesture, uttering a polite "Thanks" as he used it to light his cigarette. He then handed the lighter back to the other man and leant further into the wall behind him, feeling as if he was sinking in to the mix of brick and wood as he inhaled and exhaled the smoke from his lungs and felt the familiar, comforting rush of nicotine in his system.

Ignacio sighed as he continued to breathe the poisonous smoke from his cigarette, beginning to feel furthermore relaxed than he already was with the amount of alcohol running in his veins. He stared out into the distance, attempting to focus on one of the faraway street lights until Yev asked what brought him to New Zealand. His gaze then moved to the other man, looking him up and down as he pondered his answer because though it had only been a few moments Ignacio seemed to forget how interesting the mans features and personality were. He motioned his hand to remove the cigarette from his lips as he said "Pleasure, always." as anyone, even someone so presently and harshly affected by alcohol as Ignacio was could regocnise the meaning behind Yev's words. "Are you here for pleasure, too?" He then questioned the other man as he returned his precious cigarette to his lips and puffed from it. His interactions with Yev were evidently leading somewhere and Ignacio was just as interested to find out as he was amused. Among the stress of his career and looking after his family, it had been a while since Ignacio completely let go and had a genuine amount of fun for a night, and the prospect of changing that seemed to become more apparent by the minute. ​

 

[Yevheniy Kharchenko]

The Scit leader smiled a little at the thanks before waiting to take to back the lighter, he had always from the moment he'd begun smoking preferred to light the cigarette's with a muggle lighter rather than with his wand, not only did it make it easier to strike up conversations with muggle girls, but he liked the sound it made, it was almost as comforting as the taste of the cigarette itself in his mouth. The man inhaled deeply with the cigarette on his lips as he pocketed the lighter, before leaning his head up and blowing out the smoke, watching in his drunken state as the smoke rose and disappeared, his gaze returned to the man in front of him, and smirked a little at the mention of pleasure. He couldn't help it, while he spent a lot of his time working, fighting, he was always looking out for pleasure and tonight he would be more than happy to spend it with this man in front of him, while there was something about him that made Yev think that he could probably try recruiting him to the scits he wasn't too interested in mixing business with pleasure, the people he he to lead over were not people he wanted to do anything with. This man, he would be more than happy to, seek the pleasure out in him.

As the question was returned to Yevheniy he brought the cigarette up to his lips and inhaled again, letting the smoke come out in a long stream as he exhaled, "I am," he replied his tone softer than it would normally be, but the smirk remained strong, he was drunk enough to know that this was the right decision and to know that this would only help him feel more relaxed, Ignacio in front of him was far out of Yev's league, though Yev knew he more than a few things working for him, but this man if he was sober wasn't someone Yev thought he'd ever have a chance with, so he decided to act strong now, egged on with the alcohol coursing through his system and he closed the distance, letting his eyes linger on the man's lips as he closed the distance, Yevheniy met the man's gaze before leaning in and kissing Ignacio on the lips, holding nothing back in that moment as he did so. Yev had been searching for a little night like this, he had definitely struck luck with this man as long as he'd picked up the right signals, if not then Yevheniy was pretty certain it might lead to a fight, and he wasn't against that either. Finally he broke away and the smirk returned easily to his lips, wanting to see if this was kind of pleasure that Ignacio was interested in pursuing.
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